Former Exile Holds Power in West African Nation

ADAM NOSSITER

Wednesday

May 26, 2010 at 5:11 AM

The American government sees Rear Adm. José Américo Bubo Na Tchuto as a trafficking mastermind in Bissau, a global narcotics hub.

BISSAU, Guinea-Bissau — For months, as the United States Treasury Department prepared to declare him a drug kingpin and a major figure in the international narcotics trade, Rear Adm. José Américo Bubo Na Tchuto was hiding out in the unlikeliest of places — living in the United Nations building here, sleeping on a mattress on the floor of a United Nations office and sometimes eating in the canteen.

All the while, a coup was hatching, possibly by his hand. Last month, soldiers loyal to Mr. Na Tchuto stormed the United Nations building as he was eating breakfast and also seized his political enemies — including the nation’s prime minister and its army chief — to make it safe for him to leave.

Now Mr. Na Tchuto rides around this crumbling West African capital in an outsize pickup truck flanked by a personal guard of soldiers, offering his booming greeting to well-wishers. The president is still nominally in charge, but officials in the region worry that the nation has effectively fallen into the hands of a drug baron.

“Bubo Na Tchuto is actually the force behind the forces,” said Dr. Abdel Fatau Musah, the political director for the Economic Community of West African States, a regional bloc of nations. “The fact that he is controlling things is very unpleasant for the region.”

In the eyes of the American government, Mr. Na Tchuto is a trafficking mastermind in a country that has become a global narcotics hub: the point man, for instance, when hundreds of pounds of cocaine were unloaded from a plane at the minuscule local airport two years ago.

On April 8, just a week after the coup, the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control listed him and the air force chief of staff as drug lords and froze whatever assets they might have in the United States.

“We’ve been looking at these individuals for months,” said Adam J. Szubin, the agency’s director.

And yet, as Mr. Na Tchuto took refuge at the United Nations building, the secretary general’s representative in Bissau, Joseph Mutaboba, was reassuring the Security Council in New York that “conditions were now in place for political stability” in the country and that Guinea-Bissau was on a “journey towards peace, democracy and prosperity,” according to a Security Council announcement from March 5.

In an interview, Mr. Mutaboba said his fugitive guest, who was wanted by the government here for treason, had been given sanctuary only reluctantly. The United Nations said at the time that Mr. Na Tchuto stepped onto the compound uninvited and declared that his life was in danger, making it “mindful of international human rights obligations governing such situations.”

Mr. Mutaboba said there was “no sign” that Mr. Na Tchuto was plotting a coup inside the building and that his cellphones had been confiscated to prevent trouble. Still, he acknowledged that it was possible that Mr. Na Tchuto had made contact with the outside.

“You cannot read deeply into what the military are up to, especially when you have shifting, opportunistic alliances,” Mr. Mutaboba said.

Now a free man, Mr. Na Tchuto also denied spending his time under the auspices of the United Nations plotting the April 1 coup. But in an interview at his lawyer’s office here, he noted: “I am a former guerrilheiro. I have the strength to transform difficult situations into something favorable.”

Still, the sudden onslaught of soldiers had taken him by surprise, he said, as have the American government’s allegations of drug trafficking.

“There’s no material proof that I was involved in drugs,” he said angrily. “Proof, proof, proof, proof. People say I am a criminal! I am a patriot!” he said, boasting about his service during the country’s war of liberation against the Portuguese in the 1960s and 1970s, which he said he joined at the age of 14.

For the United Nations, his presence in the multistory headquarters on a rutted road here has been a source of discomfort, both before and after the coup.

“The whole international community here was astonished at the U.N. behavior,” a Western diplomat in Bissau said. “They didn’t understand why they were harboring such a character. He was not just sitting there watching television.”

Paulo Gorjão, director of the Portuguese Institute of International Relations and Security in Lisbon, goes even further: “He was under the protection of the U.N., planning a coup against the government. It was perfect.”

Hours after the coup, Mr. Na Tchuto appeared with his ally, Gen. Antonio Indjai, the new army chief, at a news conference introducing the country’s new bosses. Mr. Na Tchuto, who had been navy chief of staff under a previous government, did not get his old job back, but he still plays a very influential, if officially somewhat nebulous, role.

It was a stunning reversal for a man who had spent over a year in exile in Gambia, accused by those then leading Guinea-Bissau of plotting a coup against them. Mr. Na Tchuto sneaked back into the country on a fishing boat shortly after Christmas last year.

By turns genial and explosive, Mr. Na Tchuto appeared hurt by the American accusations, insisting that he admired America deeply, had dreamed about President Obama and had a large American flag in his living room.

“I ask the Americans to help establish justice and peace in this country,” he said, noting the history of instability here. There have been at least seven successful or attempted coups since independence in 1974, and in the last 12 years 4 presidents, 4 acting presidents and 11 prime ministers.

Mr. Na Tchuto deflected a question about whether he was now the real boss in Guinea-Bissau, saying through his lawyer that he “didn’t want to offend” the current president and army chief of staff by responding.

Others here are more blunt. “Bubo Na Tchuto has power, and he has money — and we know he has money from drugs — and he has a lot of people behind him,” said Idrissa Djaló, a leading businessman and former presidential candidate. “And so the situation is uncontrollable.”

At his hearing on the lingering treason charges last week, Mr. Na Tchuto looked relaxed, showing up with his military guard and joking on the front porch of the military tribunal building with the officers who were going to judge him. It was all a mere “formality,” he said later.

A small crowd gathered across the street to stare at Mr. Na Tchuto in his navy blue admiral’s uniform. Everybody knew who he was. “He is a great chief,” murmured a man looking on, Do Geloso, a tailor. “He’s got the power.”

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